Sierra Club & NRDC
Urge Calls to White House about Clean Air Rules and New Source
Review

DATE: January 17, 2002

BACKGROUND: The Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense
Council (NRDC) are urging their members to call the White House
January 17 and ask the President to not "reward his campaign
contributors by rolling back the Clean Air Act." This is
in reference to the administration's plans to modify the New Source
Review (NSR) rules, which govern how much existing power plants
and refineries must spend on updating pollution controls when
they modify plants.

TEN SECOND RESPONSE: Our air has been getting cleaner
over the last 25 years. It is now time to review the cumbersome
regulations imposed on industry so Americans can enjoy an inexpensive
and abundant supply of electricity.

THIRTY SECOND RESPONSE: We all want clean air and we've
made great strides in achieving it. There must also be a balance
so that we can continue to have abundant supplies of electricity
and petroleum. We can achieve both. The administration should
review the NSR rules to make it easier for industry to continue
supplying Americans with needed energy. After all, few big "base
load" power plants are being built due to ever-changing NSR
rules and no new refineries have been built in over 25 years.

DISCUSSION: Existing generating plants and refineries
were grandfathered in when the Clean Air Act was written in the
1970s but are required to install new pollution control equipment
if major "modifications" are made to existing plants.
There continues to be disagreements on what constitutes "maintenance"
versus "modification." The EPA is expected to recommend
revisions to the rules shortly.

Environmentalists are urging that no change be made in the
NSR rules while industry would like the rules modified to make
it easier for them to obtain permits to build new plants. NSR
rules have changed 29 times in the last four years. The frequency
of these changes make the construction of new plants costly and
uncertain for investors.

Scott Segal, a lawyer representing power companies, is quoted
in the New York Times (January 16) as claiming "the
current interpretation of the rules for New Source Review"
could result in a loss of generating capacity for 12 million households
each year. Coal-fired plants, which are greatly affected by these
rules, account for over 50 percent of the electric power in the
U.S.

Meanwhile, the Pacific Research Institute (PRI) reports in
its Index of Leading Environmental Indicators 2001 that
according to EPA national air quality data "the aggregate
measures show that the nation as a whole meets the EPA targets
for clean air." In addition, the EPA's Air Quality Index
showed that the "number of days during which various cities
reached the unhealthful threshold" saw a large improvement
since 1998. PRI concluded that "we may have reached a major
turning point in our long effort to improve air quality."
For a link to the report: http://www.pacificresearch.org/pub/sab/enviro/01_enviroindex/index.html.

by Gretchen Randall, Director
John P. McGovern, MD Center for Environmental and Regulatory Affairs
The National Center for Public Policy Research

Contact the author at: 773-857-5086 or [email protected]
The National Center for Public Policy Research
Chicago office
3712 North Broadway - PMB 279
Chicago, IL 60613